SAIC Report: Iranian Schoolbooks Emphasize Shi’a Islam

Editor’s note: Science Applications International Corporation receives your tax money to state the obvious, even the banal.

The textbooks that are used in Iranian elementary, middle and high schools “reveal a clear emphasis on Islam, as it has been interpreted by the leadership of the Islamic Republic of Iran,” according to a recent contractor study (pdf) performed for U.S. intelligence.

That rather banal observation is among “the most important conclusions” of the open source intelligence study.

The study culls tendentious statements from 85 Persian-language textbooks, and surveys them without much analytical insight or empathy.

Among its dubious verdicts: The schoolbooks “provide a distorted view of Shia Islam as the only true path in Islam, and among religions.”

The study, hosted by the DNI Open Source Center, was performed under government contract by Science Applications International Corporation.

Like most other finished intelligence from the Open Source Center, the study has not been approved for public release, but a copy was obtained by Secrecy News.